Thursday, May 26, 2011

With TEPCO again running out of space to hide (aka move) the highly contaminated water from the Reactors 2 and 3 at Fukushima I Nuke Plant, the hope is that the water treatment facility being built by AREVA will be in operation in June.

I mentioned the "rumor" in my post yesterday that the cost to treat 1 tonne of contaminated water will cost TEPCO/Japanese taxpayers 200 million yen (US$2.44 million). In addition to the exorbitant cost, some people are asking, "What exactly will the facility do? What types of radioactive materials is it capable of removing from the water?"

After all, it will be the first even for AREVA to treat radioactive water of this level of contamination.

To my (feigned) surprise, no one in the Japanese government seems to know exactly what the facility is designed to do, and TEPCO is not saying anything, because it is under the "confidentiality [non-disclosure] clause" of the agreement with the French company.

Why any work related to Fukushima I Nuke Plant is still considered "private" is a mystery to me, when the entire world is being affected and the Japanese taxpayers will likely be required to pick up the tab.

A Japanese writer Ryuichi Kino wrote about the TEPCO-AREVA agreement on his blog, and the following is my quick translation of his post in Japanese (emphasis is mine):

Doubt on the TEPCO's plan to remove the contaminated water based on the AREVA's water processing system, whose system details are not publicly disclosed

There's one thing that I have been wondering about for a while. I have asked about it several times during the press conferences and for which I have always gotten incomplete answers, and that is the AREVA's water processing system. The AREVA's system is basically for the removal of radioactive cesium, and it is not known if it removes any other radionuclides.

I forgot when was the first time I asked about the processing system for the contaminated water, but I do recall that I asked the question in the May 1 press conference. I had heard somewhere that the noble gas like iodine would be released untreated, so I asked whether it was true. The answer was that it was true [that iodine would be released untreated]. TEPCO seemed to think it wouldn't make much difference now that the roof of the reactor building had been blown off anyway in the Reactors 1 and 3.

It does make a difference in terms of reducing the release of radioactive materials into the environment, but what became clear in the press conference [of the government/TEPCO consolidated headquarters for dealing with the Fukushima I Nuke accident] yesterday (May 19) was an even bigger problem. To my surprise, TEPCO said the details of the AREVA's water processing system were "not to be disclosed, due to the contractual obligation." What is going on with the effort to wind down the Fukushima I accident, when the critical information is withheld due to "contractual obligation"?

What's even more surprising was that Prime Minister's Assistant Goshi Hosono, who acts as the secretary of this joint headquarters for the accident, didn't know the details of the water processing system either. Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency didn't know either. I was appalled.

The following is the summary of the answers given by TEPCO and government officials [regarding the AREVA's system] during May 19 press conference:

TEPCO's Matsumoto:"The main purpose of the AREVA's water treatment system is to remove cesium. I hear that it could also remove other gamma [ray-emitting nuclides?] and metal (such as strontium). However, due to the contractual obligation with AREVA, it is not to be disclosed what other nuclides can be removed and how much. I'm told that is the agreement between TEPCO and AREVA."

NISA's Nishiyama:"In building the water processing system, the details of the system needs to be reported [to NISA] in order to ascertain the safety. The details would include the types of nuclides to be treated. We would have to further consider how to deal with the non-disclosure issue in the agreement."

PM Assistant Hosono:"I didn't know that [the details were not disclosed]. All I paid attention to was radioactive iodine and cesium, but there are other radionuclides. Is AREVA saying there is no data on other radionuclides? Or is is saying there is such data but not willing to disclose? I'll confirm [with AREVA?]. The data should be made public. If AREVA doesn't have information on other radionuclides [other than iodine and cesium], I would like to request the company to run the system, obtain the data, and then disclose the data."

TEPCO admitted that strontium was one of the nuclides to be processed, but didn't have information on plutonium and uranium. I simply don't understand why Hosono, representing the consolidated headquarters, and NISA were not aware of the situation [surrounding the AREVA's water treatment system].

Both the consolidated headquarters and NISA must have had a major role in crafting the [revised] "roadmap" announced on May 17. But they didn't know the details. What was the "roadmap" based on? Is it just a wish list [as many critics alleged], after all?

Without the detailed information on the types of nuclides to be processed, we wouldn't know how to treat and dispose the filters after the contaminated water is processed, and how to treat and dispose the still contaminated water after it is processed.

As to the contaminated water after being processed, it may be OK, as Hosono said in the press conference, "to analyze after the treatment", even though it gives the impression that the government is "behind the curve". Who is going to treat the filters that catch radioactive materials and where? What are the radioactive materials that need to be treated and disposed and how much, by the time the accident is wound down? Without the details of the water processing system, the "roadmap" doesn't even address such things.

I have another doubt. [TEPCO] seems to have abandoned the idea of "water entombment" for the Reactor 1, and instead try to process the contaminated water in the basement using the AREVA's system and put it back into the reactor core. However, without knowing what nuclides are still in the water after the treatment, is it safe to circulate this water? The more this water circulates, the radioactive materials not treated by the AREVA's system will increase in the water.

Neither NISA nor Hosono seems to think the current situation is acceptable. But will the detailed information be disclosed? It is rumored that the final cost of processing the contaminated water will run up to over 10 trillion yen (US$123 billion). The system that costly, and the details are not disclosed. Not only am I not satisfied with this non-disclosure, but I am also doubtful whether the accident is really being wound down.

I believe there should be a 3rd-party organization, other than TEPCO, to check the progress of the "roadmap" as soon as possible. A nuclear power plants is an ultra-complex system, and it is easy to fool a layman. It may be necessary to have people with the experience in working in the nuclear power plants in such an organization.

Anne Lauvergeaon, Areva's head, has declared during a talk at the CFR, on May 4 th 2011:

"Our energy choices, our energy future, must be built on the basic triangle made by safety, security and transparence. This is true for nuclear energy, of course, but as shown by -- last year by the Deepwater accident, I am deeply convinced that it is true for any energy project. Those are the core values I have put in Areva's DNA since I created this company -- we created this company 10 years ago."

Actually yes the water itself will become radioactive because of the Tritium involved, distillation doesn't remove Tritium. "Like normal hydrogen, tritium can bond with oxygen to form water. When this happens, the resulting water (called “tritiated water”) is radioactive. Tritiated water (not to be confused with heavy water) is chemically identical to normal water and the tritium cannot be filtered out of the water".

Also I doubt they'd use distillation on such a vast amount of water it would take way too much energy to heat all the water to steam (or this may explain the expense). The generally preferred method for nuclear decontamination in water is ionic capture/exchange resin. This filter medium removes a bulk of the radioactive material but the resin then has to be vitrified and stored. Ionic capture also doesn't work on Tritium the separation method used for Tritium is so expensive they'll probably just ignore the Tritium.

If I were the nuclear industry I'd try to keep this water boondoggle quiet too. $124 billion + just to deal with the contaminated water in an unspecified fashion just goes to show how expensive "cheap, clean" nuclear power can actually be. I'm sure if the details of the deal are leaked we'll come to find out that the water will only be purified to a level that they have determined won't cause "immediate" human harm before it is released back into the environment.

The nuke industry has a long history of exactly this behavior. Experts and humble mathmeticians could try to calculate how much radiation and radioactive contaminants Fukushima has already created IF enough variables are known. Organizations like the IAEA and other pro nuke tribes always labor to make it impossible to calculate the actual values. They MUST confuse or hold back enough mathematic variables to make it impossible to calculate or 'prove' how much damage was done to humanity. Then, pro nuke organizations feel free to lie about the total amount of radiation released. Later, when the truth of early deaths and injuries leaks out, and later when cancer levels soar off the charts, the nuke liars say "The nuclear accident did not release enough radiation to cause the level of cancer (or death) you claim it caused." For example - TMI. Residents living nearby accurately described the odd color of puddles of radioactive iodine pooling on their cement patios after the rains, people are treated for and describe their radiation related injuries, and residents record anomalies like a perfectly new tin roof on a house guaranteed to last 50 years in normal weather suddenly 'eaten away' (eroded with holes through the metal) by rain containing nuclear fallout. TMI officials deny all this by saying "X amount of radiation which TMI released could not account for Y damage to your roof/kidney/family etc." Whose 'measurements' are used for the official record? Why the plant operator's 'measurements', of course. After the Soviet officer tasked with ACCURATELY reporting the levels of radiation released by Chernobyl to the IAEA, he said the panel sat in stunned silence...and then Hans Blix, and his peers, revised the numbers downward by a factor of 10 - the IAEA in Europe recorded one tenth (1/10) of the radiation reported released by Soviet nuclear engineers and experts handling the emergency. So if Ariva says how many tons or kilograms of radioactive Cesium it can remove from water and what percentage it is capable of removing from tainted water - people would then use this information to extrapolate other values and derive more information about other contaminants that are likely present and not removed. This information would probably show tragically high levels of isotopes in water and then extrapolations would continue to estimate airborne fallout, anticipated illnesses and casualties - everything the IAEA and others plan to vigorously deny. Hope

Source term. That's what it's called, that's what the media and the public should be demanding to know.

"How much radioactive stuff do you estimate has been released, TOTAL?

One question. The journalists should ask nothing else at the press conferences. They should stand up in turn and ask this question, over and over. The resulting deafening silence should be on the evening news, every day.

Instead of all this cosy corporate non-disclosure nonsense, how about inviting a firm that knows exactly what it is doing, and patiently describes its processes on a website. It would also be a far cheaper approach than anything AREVA might come up with!

http://www.ecovac.de/ - check it out, Japan, before bringing in more corporate grief.

Yes, its true, water can become tritiated with a 20 year half life. But hydrogen and oxygen don't form stable isotopes with longer half lives more than 24 hours. Only a small portion of the water in any nuclear reactor becomes tritiated. Thus water does not become radioactive.

To me, that's magically beautiful.

*sniff*

But I emailed Mr. Gunderson @fairewinds associates to see if he can explain that to us.

The scale of the water treatment task is enormous and it will take a long time to complete. Even if all goes well and there are no additional problems, it will be mid 2012 before the flooding is ended.That means TEPCO is correct to ignore iodine, it will have decayed by the time this task is half done.

Getting out the cesium is tough enough, especially from a salt water contaminated starting material. The cesium is in truly minute quantities, parts per billion or less, much less than the sodium from the salt. Sequestering it will be expensive, but surely cheaper than the alternative of dumping three reactors worth of fission products into the coastal waters of Japan.

"Only a small portion of the water in any nuclear reactor becomes tritiated. Thus water does not become radioactive".

You need to think outside the box or in this case the reactors & SFP's. Only a small portion is generated in properly operating nuclear reactors (see below). That assumption goes out the window when the fuel melts down or explodes into vapor & particles. BWR reactors don't use boron in coolant water unless there is an emergency so they produce very little Tritium. PWR are a different matter but they "scrub" their Tritium out. TEPCO has been using boron in their BWR's off and on for months to battle recriticality and there has been plenty of free oxygen ready to combine with the liberated Tritium. You don't get hydrogen explosions without free oxygen, you don't get attempts at nitrogen purges unless you have copious amounts of free oxygen, You don't use hydrazine unless you have A LOT of free oxygen eating every reactive surface it touches. They have probably created large amounts of titrated water with a half life of 12.3 years (not 20).

"But hydrogen and oxygen don't form stable isotopes with longer half lives more than 24 hours."

Wha...? 1 Hydrogen and 2 oxygen molecules make water and if the hydrogen molecule is Tritium it has a half life of 12.3 years (tritium isn't a stable isotope).

"Nuclear power plants routinely and accidentally release tritium into the air and water as a gas (HT) or as water (HTO or 3HOH). No economically feasible technology exists to filter tritium from a nuclear power plant’s gaseous and liquid emissions to the environment. Therefore, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission does not require that it be filtered."

"Only a small portion of the water in any nuclear reactor becomes tritiated. Thus water does not become radioactive".

You need to think outside the box or in this case the reactors & SFP's. Only a small portion is generated in properly operating nuclear reactors (see below). That assumption goes out the window when the fuel melts down or explodes into vapor & particles. BWR reactors don't use boron in coolant water unless there is an emergency so they produce very little Tritium. PWR are a different matter but they "scrub" their Tritium out. TEPCO has been using boron in their BWR's off and on for months to battle recriticality and there has been plenty of free oxygen ready to combine with the liberated Tritium. You don't get hydrogen explosions without free oxygen, you don't get attempts at nitrogen purges unless you have copious amounts of free oxygen, You don't use hydrazine unless you have A LOT of free oxygen eating every reactive surface it touches. They have probably created large amounts of titrated water with a half life of 12.3 years (not 20).

"But hydrogen and oxygen don't form stable isotopes with longer half lives more than 24 hours."

Wha...? 1 Hydrogen and 2 oxygen molecules make water and if the hydrogen molecule is Tritium it has a half life of 12.3 years (tritium isn't a stable isotope).

"Nuclear power plants routinely and accidentally release tritium into the air and water as a gas (HT) or as water (HTO or 3HOH). No economically feasible technology exists to filter tritium from a nuclear power plant’s gaseous and liquid emissions to the environment. Therefore, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission does not require that it be filtered."

About my coverage of Japan Earthquake of March 11

I am Japanese, and I not only read Japanese news sources for information on earthquake and the Fukushima Nuke Plant but also watch press conferences via the Internet when I can and summarize my findings, adding my observations.

About This Site

Well, this was, until March 11, 2011. Now it is taken over by the events in Japan, first earthquake and tsunami but quickly by the nuke reactor accident. It continues to be a one-person (me) blog, and I haven't even managed to update the sidebars after 5 months... Thanks for coming, spread the word.------------------This is an aggregator site of blogs coming out of SKF (double-short financials ETF) message board at Yahoo.

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